The Lost Girl of Astor Street

by Stephanie Morrill

  He only looks at me.

  Other words sit on my tongue. I want to tell Walter about the Finnegans. About how Mr. Barrow—the lowlife—threatened my dog. But Walter doesn’t want to hear that, does he? He wants me to go back to who I was before Lydia was killed. When Ms. Underhill and her ruler were my greatest fears.

  I love Walter, so I pick a shade of the truth. “I’m starving.”

  He turns the key, and the Ford rumbles to life. “Then let’s eat.”

  And he seems content to pretend the whole thing never happened.

  CHAPTER

  NINETEEN

  It’s undeniable that Jane makes a beautiful bride. Her raven hair gleams under the white veil as she turns toward us. Her mother and sisters gasp, and even my mouth falls open.

  “Oh, Janie.” Her mother adjusts how the veil drapes over her daughter’s shoulders. “You’re radiant.”

  Resentment falls like a hammer, having nothing to do with Jane being almost my stepmother, but rather with the way her mother looks at her on her wedding day. With Mother and Lydia gone, who will care enough to fawn over me when my turn comes?

  A knock sounds on the bedroom door. “Piper?”

  Never has Walter’s voice been so welcome.

  “I’ll be right back,” I say to Jane’s family as I rush away.

  “Careful in your dress,” Jane calls after me.

  I open the bedroom door just wide enough to slip through, and I grin up at Walter as I close it behind me. “Thank you,” I whisper. “It was ridiculous in there.”

  Walter’s gaze travels my peach dress, made of silk and heavy with beads, and down to my strappy, toe-pinching shoes. “I’m not sure I would’ve even recognized you like this. You look so . . .” He waves his hand, as if that’s sufficient for completing his thought.

  “It’s not like I had any say in the matter.” I can’t keep my words from sounding cross. I actually thought I looked pretty nice. “This is just what she put me in.”

  “I didn’t mean it in a bad way, Pippy. Just that you look different than normal.”

  “Did you need something?”

  “Mariano is on the phone for you.”

  I clatter down the stairs to Father’s office as fast as my pained toes will allow. When I reach the telephone, I say a breathless, “Hi.”

  “I’m trying to wrap up a report before I come to the wedding, so I don’t have long, but I saw the message you left for me. Is it urgent?”

  “Very.” In a string of words, I detail what I learned from David Barrow the night before, ignoring as best I can the looks Walter gives me as he stands beside the desk. “So, obviously,” I conclude, “we need to put together a plan to go after the Finnegans.”

  “Piper,” Mariano and Walter simultaneously say. Mariano’s tone is a warning, Walter’s a chastisement.

  “I said a plan. Which means I clearly don’t intend to just rush into their headquarters.”

  “We can’t go after them without convincing evidence,” Mariano says. “We just can’t. And it’s not like I haven’t already looked for it.”

  Walter has taken to pacing the room.

  I angle away from him. “But why not? They’re not so untouchable, are they? It’s not like they’re Al Capone.”

  “It should scare you that Al Capone is our measuring stick, Piper.”

  “We have an eyewitness who saw their car. That’s evidence.”

  “He’s also a witness who doesn’t want to talk. That’s a problem. We can discuss this more at the wedding, okay? As it is, I’m already going to miss the ceremony.”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  “Of course it does. This is a hard day for you. I want to be there.”

  “Oh.” Seems a silly thing to say, but I’m too shocked by his thoughtfulness to think up anything clever. “Well . . . good-bye.”

  I place the ear piece back on the hook. Even without me saying so, Mariano knew today would be hard for me. He cared about that.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” Walter’s expression—jaw clenched, eyes narrowed—matches his rock-hard tone.

  “About the Finnegans?”

  “I was with you all night. How could you not tell me?”

  I straighten my shoulders so we’re not quite so unevenly matched. “Maybe I didn’t want to get yelled at any more than I already was.”

  I walk past him.

  He stays right on my heels. “I only yelled at you last night because it seems like you don’t care at all about your personal safety. I know you want to find Lydia at all costs, but your life is too high a price to pay.”

  “You’re being dramatic. It won’t come to that.”

  Listen to him, Piper. Lydia’s voice, soft and urgent.

  My mind flits to finding Father with his gun, his chair facing the front door as if expectant. To the look in Mariano’s eyes as he detailed that Lydia had been wearing my coat, carrying a handkerchief with my initials.

  To my nightstand drawer, inexplicably open when it should have been closed.

  I stop at the foot of the stairs and face Walter. “I’m not stupid. I won’t go after them on my own.”

  Walter holds my gaze a moment. Opens his mouth. Closes it.

  “Piper?” Jane’s voice from above is like a blast of winter Chicago wind. “I need you up here.”

  I breathe out a private, frustrated sigh. “For what?”

  Even from the first floor, I see the pinch of her expression. “It’s almost time to go. We need to finish getting ready.”

  “I’m done.”

  “Piper, come upstairs now.”

  She’s less than a decade older than me, but she thinks she can use the same commands my mother did when I was five?

  “Piper.” My name is a whispered admonishment on Walter’s lips, and it’s like a smack of betrayal. He turns to Jane in her snow-white glory up on the staircase. “You look lovely, Miss Miller. I’ll bring the car around.”

  Just like at the speakeasy, I suddenly feel as though he’s abandoned me.

  “Thank you, Walter.” Her dismissal is cool as she glides down the stairs toward me.

  He slips away.

  “Piper.” Jane’s voice is crisp, like a bite of sour apple. “I’m sure today isn’t the happiest day of your life. And I know you’re used to running this place—”

  A snort escapes me.

  “But today is my day.” Her eyes are sharp. “I’ve watched both my little sisters get married, many of my younger cousins, and all my college girlfriends. Today is finally my turn, and you’re not going to ruin this by making time with the hired help. Do you understand me?”

  She doesn’t wait for my answer—which would have been an incredulous, “Making time?”—just holds her white lace skirts and marches upstairs.

  I grip the banister as my head spins with anger.

  “That lady is a real piece of work.”

  I startle at the sound of Alana’s voice. She’s tucked away in the living room, looking like the embodiment of the modern woman in her fringed lavender dress and crystal diadem. She is graceful and feminine, and beside her I’m a child playing dress up.

  “When did you get here?”

  “Joyce let me in a few minutes before you and Walter came down. I didn’t know Nick was already at the church.” Alana draws a silver cigarette case from her beaded purse. “Fancy a smoke?”

  Bad idea, Piper, chides Lydia’s disapproving voice.

  “No, but air would be nice.”

  Outside, the early afternoon is glorious. A lake-blue sky full of fluffy clouds, the golden orb of the sun, and a warm, summery breeze.

  “Don’t take what Jane said too personally.” Alana pops open her cigarette case once more, and holds it out like a tray of appetizers. “That was about her, not you.”

  “Thanks, but I don’t care what she thinks.” I wave away the offered cigarette, but note the engraved initials that wink in the sunlight. “M.B.?”

  Alana blinks slowly. “Pa
rdon?”

  “The initials on your case. M.B.”

  “Oh.” She smiles and snaps the case shut. “My mother’s. From before she was married.”

  My mind drifts to Elsie Ann Sail, who was everything a woman of her day was supposed to be. And who should have turned forty-six today, if the world was a place that operated as it should.

  Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you—the song flows from my heart, floods my eyes—happy birthday, dear mother, happy birthday to you.

  “Nice that you have something to remember her by while you’re away,” I say. Alana turns to me, noting, I’m sure, the watery quality of my voice. “Today is my mother’s birthday. Or would’ve been, of course.”

  Alana looks to the street, where Walter pulls the Chrysler alongside the curb. “I like you, Piper.” She sighs, as if this is somehow a sad thing. “I wish all of this were better for you.”

  Jane barges out the front door and saunters past me without a glance. Her mother and sisters trail behind her, their shoes click-clacking down the front steps to the idling car.

  “But girls like us keep moving forward.” Alana stomps out her cigarette, and when she looks at me I notice she’s not as beautiful as I initially thought. Rather, the way she appears and carries herself gives the illusion of beauty. Her voice is quiet, thoughtful, when she adds, “I hope you make it out of this okay.”

  “Piper, let’s go!” Mrs. Miller—who already informed me I’m not to call her Grandma—calls from within the car. “We’ll be late!”

  I take a deep breath. I love you, Mother. And I force my feet to move down the steps and through the gate.

  “Is there anything in this world more boring than a wedding?” I mutter under my breath to Tim.

  “No. Especially when you’re hungry,” he says through his smile.

  The flashbulb pops—finally!—and I let the smile fall off my face.

  Gretchen turns to my brother, her eyes wide and the corners of her mouth downturned.

  “Not our wedding, of course, dear.” Tim squeezes her shoulder. “You had ours planned perfectly.”

  Gretchen seems mollified. She adjusts Howie on her hip. “Except for the carrot cake.”

  Her sigh is heavy, and she gives me a despairing head shake, as if we’re commiserating together. As if I have the foggiest idea of what went wrong with the carrot cake at their wedding three years ago.

  “Okay, all the family is dismissed,” the photographer says in his pinched voice. “Only the happy couple needs to stay.”

  Thank goodness.

  My shoes wobble beneath me as I attempt to speed walk up the front steps of the Congress Hotel. There are chairs in the ballroom, and I need a chair even more than I need something to eat. Would anyone notice if I went barefoot the rest of the night? Somehow, I think yes.

  The golden ballroom is warm with chatter and laughter. The honey-colored tablecloths are still fresh, the fussy white flowers perky in the clear vases, and the food—slabs of beef, salads in lettuce cups, and an abundance of other colorful dishes—are still mounded on the buffet line.

  And there’s the head table, full of glorious empty chairs. I sink into one with a sigh and give thanks for whoever dreamed up tablecloths long enough to conceal that I’m removing my shoes.

  More family—family that did not race as I did—filters into the room, causing a stir of excitement in the crowd, most likely because it indicates dinner will soon be served.

  Gretchen takes the seat beside me, then giggles. “Oh, that’s so cute! You want your auntie Piper, don’t you?”

  Howie’s arms are extended, his hands trying to grasp me. Or, more likely, the sparkling beads on my dress.

  “I’m sure it’s just a fluke.”

  “No, he definitely wants you.” With that, Gretchen plunks Howie onto my lap.

  He looks up at me with large, dark eyes and an unsmiling mouth. It’s like he knows I have no clue what I’m doing.

  “You just love your auntie, don’t you?” Gretchen coos.

  He turns to his mother, and then back to me for more staring.

  I give his curly head a pat, only to find my fingers mesmerized by his cloud-soft hair.

  See? Babies aren’t so bad, Lydia says to me as Howie grabs fistfuls of skirt in his chubby hands.

  My stomach growls four times before Father and Jane are announced and enter the ballroom. (Heaven forbid Jane simply enter a room on her special day.) But at least they’re here, and we can eat.

  “How many people are you feeding off that plate, sis?” Tim asks as we settle into our seats after our turn through the buffet line.

  I stick my tongue out at him, and beneath the shelter of the tablecloth, I again slip off my pinchy shoes. I shovel food into my mouth between chats with those who stop by to say a “brief hello” and fawn over Howie.

  I’ve just swallowed a large bite of dinner roll when I sense someone standing beside me, and a rumbly male voice says, “You must be the famous Piper Sail.”

  I look up and blink into the dark eyes of a tall, imposing Italian man. He’s not overweight, just solid. Broad shoulders, a thick chest, and powerful legs. With a scowl, he’d be intimidating, but his smile is full and his eyes indicate a man of good humor.

  I dab my mouth with a cream-colored napkin. “I don’t know that I’m exactly famous, but I haven’t yet met another Piper Sail.”

  “You’re famous at my house, anyway.” The man sticks out his hand, which is massive, like a baseball mitt. “Giovanni Cassano. Mariano’s father. Pleasure to meet you, Miss Sail.”

  Oh. Oh. “I . . . Yes, you too, sir.”

  His grip on my hand is surprisingly gentle. “My son speaks very highly of you.”

  And I have no idea how to respond to that. “Thank you. He does of you too.” I think he does, anyway. Mariano doesn’t seem to like talking about his family. “Is he here yet?”

  “I expect him at any minute. He wasn’t supposed to be long at the office today, but . . .” Giovanni shrugs his shoulders.

  “Mr. Cassano.” I startle at the sound of Tim’s voice. He rises from the table, his hand outstretched. “Great to see you, sir. So glad you could make it.”

  “Glad to have been invited. I finally get the chance to meet your lovely wife.”

  How does my brother know Giovanni Cassano? A memory tickles at me, like a song you know, yet can’t quite recall the exact tune. Is it Tim whom I’ve heard talk about the Cassano family? Or Nick? I think, maybe, I’ve heard Nick saying—

  “Piper.” Giovanni nods toward the entrance. “Someone finally broke free from his desk.”

  In the doorway, Mariano cuts a dashing figure in his silk top hat and cutaway coat. His gaze scans the crowd, and his mouth spreads into a smile when he spots me walking toward him.

  In my stocking feet—whoops.

  “Hey, beautiful.”

  “It’s funny, but you look just like this guy I used to know.”

  “Way back last week, you mean?”

  “Mm-hmm.”

  His fingers clasp mine, but with a ballroom full of people—including both our fathers—neither of us move closer. Gray smudges beneath his eyes give away how taxing his week has been.

  “You need a good meal, detective.”

  He squeezes my hand. “I need time with my girl, Miss Sail.”

  My stomach seems to fold in on itself. “Maybe we could make both happen at once.”

  The band leader announces that Mr. and Mrs. Sail are going to enjoy their first dance—Jane’s new name grates on my ears—and the band strikes up, “You Made Me Love You.”

  All eyes in the room lock on Jane and my father, who dances like you might guess a lawyer in his late forties would. Mariano’s arm curls around my waist, and his mouth whispers against my ear. “Think they’d play ‘It Had to Be You’ if I ask ’em real nice?”

  I grin with the memory of the Parmesan-scented evening at Vernon Park, the winking stars in the sky, and the warmth of Mariano’s m
outh on mine. “If not, I’ll sic Jane on them.”

  His chuckle is a warm rumble against me.

  I happen to catch Alana’s eye—not everyone is tuned in to Father and Jane, apparently—and I return her smile, hoping she sees that, like she had hoped on the front porch hours ago, I’m getting through the day just fine.

  “Lydia getting into the car certainly implies that she knew the driver.” Mariano twirls me out and then back against him. “That’s the most disturbing thing to me. I can’t get over it. You’re sure David Barrow was telling the truth about the car?”

  “Pretty sure. But you’ve spoken to the Finnegans?”

  Mariano nods. “Jail and the cinema, remember? Rock solid.”

  My peach skirts swish against my legs as we waltz. “But what about beyond the brothers. Did you check out men who work for them? Because I could do some dig—”

  “No.” Mariano’s hand presses into my back, and my heart hiccups in my chest at our closeness. “Please, no. After the week I’ve had and everything I’ve seen with this current case, I just really want to know that you’re safe.”

  We’ve stopped dancing.

  “Okay,” I whisper.

  He exhales, clutches me tight for a moment, and then spins me out. When he pulls me back close, his gaze has that faraway look. The one he gets when he’s thinking. “But you still don’t suspect Matthew at all?”

  There’s a tightness in my chest. “Should I?”

  “I don’t know. Sometimes, he seems to make the most sense.”

  “He has an alibi too, though.”

  “Not as firm as some others.” We take several spins across the floor in silence. Mariano looks down at me, sadness in his eyes. “I’m sorry, Piper. I know you want to believe he’s been falsely accused. It’s just not in my nature to trust. Not anymore.”

  A sentiment I well understand. “The thought has crossed my mind, for sure.”

  “But . . . ?”

  “But Lydia was as naïve as she was sweet. If someone wanted her to get into the car voluntarily, I don’t think it would have been so hard, really. You could simply say you were hurt or lost or a friend of a friend or whatever, and she would’ve done it.”